Grieving family slams ‘insensitive’ hospital

A Simon’s Town family has accused False Bay Hospital of insensitivity after the mysterious death of their one-year-old child.

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Cape Town - A grieving Simon’s Town family has accused False Bay Hospital of insensitivity following the mysterious death of their one-year-old at the hospital.

The family said they also had to postpone the funeral of Likamva Jamda at the weekend after the state failed to perform an autopsy on him a week after he died.

The toddler died on February 20 after he had been vomiting and had diarrhoea.

Likamva’s grandmother, Lindiswa Thomas of Red Hill informal settlement, said the family was yet to find closure after the hospital refused to reveal the cause of his sudden death and an autopsy had yet to be carried out.

Thomas said Likamva’s body had been sent to two private morgues instead of the state mortuary in Salt River.

Monique Johnstone, the spokeswoman for the hospital, confirmed that the family hasn’t been informed of the cause of Likamva’s death as the autopsy had yet to be performed at the Salt River mortuary.

She said a miscommunication between two private mortuaries, Avbob, which was contracted to the hospital and Ferns (family undertaker), which initially received Likamva’s body, meant that “the body has still not been transported to Salt River mortuary, and therefore the post mortem is still awaited”.

It was on February 20 that Likamva’s teenage mother, Asenathi Jamda, took him to False Bay Hospital.

Jamda said when she arrived at the hospital, Likamva was rushed into a ward while she was in the waiting area. Within half-an-hour her baby was declared dead.

“It was a shock for me to see him lying there lifeless. But what was even more distressing for me was the lack of sensitivity shown by the staff.

“My baby was still lying on his back, soaked in his vomit when I was called into the room. When my mom asked the doctor what caused his sudden death, the doctor was very mean and asked ‘are you the mother of the child?’ He never gave my mom or any of us an answer. Instead, we were told to wait for the police who was to escort the mortuary van to Salt River mortuary,” she said.

After waiting for hours for the police, the family was told to go home and wait for a call from the hospital.

A police interview with the family was also to be arranged, but this never happened.

Asenathi’s family only found out that he was never taken to Salt River mortuary last Monday when they visited the mortuary.

“When we got there the mortuary had no idea who Likamva was. After lots of phone calls we were told to go to Avbob in Maitland. Avbob wouldn’t release the body though. They said we needed to get permission from False Bay Hospital,” she said.

After a lengthy meeting with senior management at the hospital, the family was told that the baby would finally be taken to Salt River, but instead he was taken to Fern mortuary - chosen by the family. After a day at Fern, the body was taken back to Avbob.

“We are very hurt by all this dashing from one place to another. We want to close the chapter of Likamva and bury him in our home in the Eastern Cape, but we can’t even do that because the post mortem hasn’t been done.

“We are in limbo. The way the hospital carries on is as if it has something to hide. This experience just adds on our pain… it’s like we are not taken seriously at all,” she said.

Johnstone regretted the manner in which the doctor concerned handled Likamva’s death, saying he was “distressed by the death of the patient and agrees that this may have affected his manner and (he had) been misconstrued as being insensitive”.

She said a family physician was in constant contact with the relevant agencies to expedite the post mortem.

Cape Argus